Joint Commiseration
by Diluted Thoughts
Summary: …because for them, amidst the turmoil and uncertainty plaguing their lives, there was only room for joint commiseration… Seth/Isis. Vague Logicshipping.
1. Chapter 1

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"He's fallen, hasn't he?"

Seth was surprised by how quiet his voice sounded in spite of the dislike he had for the individual in question. Whether she noticed this change in his usually indifferent tone of voice, she chose not to say. She only answered his question.

"Yes."

He took up a place beside the priestess he spoke to, the unusually violent wind threatening to cast his headdress to the floor. Seth thought nothing of it.

"You're afraid."

Though he had phrased the last line like a question, he had meant it as a statement. Seth felt she had caught on, for he took her silence as a positive answer.

"The future…" She trailed off, her hand going to the Tauk at her neck, "Many believe that the power of prophesying into the future is a blessing. I call it my blessing as well as my curse."

Seth's brows furrowed. "You've always told us that you cannot foresee the futures of those holding the Sennen Items. How can you be so sure that he's been killed then?"

She now turned to look at him fully for the first time since they had begun speaking.

Locking her eyes with his, she held his gaze.

"You can sense it too, can you not? The reason you came to see me this evening…it's because you suddenly, inexplicably, felt empty. Despite how much you despised him, his death took a part of you with it. It took a part of us all."

He nodded slowly. She was right. Why else would he have come to talk to her? They had never exactly been close, but had only acknowledged one another when needed with a degree of regard. To him, she had never been more than a high priestess of the court, bearer of the Sennen Tauk.

But…there _was_ more.

"It will be best if you go now, Lord Priest." She averted her eyes back to the darkening sky quickly. "There is nothing I can do to ease this unrest within you. It is something you must do alone."

Seth studied her face from the corner of his eye. While her face was expressionless, her hands gripped the railing of the terrace painfully; they were trembling slightly.

"Is that what you've been doing all this time, high priestess? Bearing the burden of your visions alone?"

She glanced at him sharply, and Seth was shocked to see that her eyes were glistening. Lowering her gaze to the floor, her expression softened.

"It's horrible knowing that those dear to you will soon be slain…and yet having no way of finding out who will be the first to go, and how to prevent their deaths…" She cut herself off, closing her eyes with a forlorn smile. "What am I saying? There is no way that we can save them. Fate is just as inevitable as death."

She laughed bitterly, a single tear balancing itself onto her cheek. A lock of hair escaped from her headdress and fell down in front of her.

Seth reached out a hand and brushed her hair back over her shoulder. He wiped away the stray tear with his thumb, and tilted her face up so that her sapphire eyes stared back at him.

"Remember, Isis, that while destiny is inevitable, it can easily be changed."

Her eyes widened at this, and only then did he pull back—when he saw recognition. Without another word, Seth turned his back to her and proceeded back into the palace. It was all that he could say; it was all that _needed_ to be said.

When he was at the door, he heard Isis whisper, faintly:

"I thank you, Seth."

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	2. Chapter 2

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"My lord?"

Isis spoke softly, lest she startle him. She'd never seen him so deep in thought. He had removed his headdress, and it lay seemingly forgotten next to him. His head was bent down, dark hair obscuring his piercing eyes from her view.

"You needn't be so formal with me. We're not at court."

He responded so late that it took Isis a brief moment to realize he was responding to her earlier address.

"It wouldn't be proper, considering that you are now Pharaoh of all Egypt."

She sat down on the bench, a polite distance away from him. Siamun had personally asked her to find him, but there was no way that she could ask him to return to the palace in this state. Something was wrong; she could feel it.

"Why have you come here?"

His tone was low and hoarse, almost a whisper.

"Why are you here, sitting alone?" she countered softly.

At that, he finally straightened and sat back. Isis glanced at him, startled to find that his typically stoic face was a mask of grief.

"She's gone, and I am to blame for her death."

"…Death?"

He opened his mouth multiple times as if to say something, but stopped himself each time. Isis folded her hands in her lap and waited.

"…She was the only light in my life…a life that is eternally damned now that she has left me." He paused. The silence was so long that Isis began to wonder if he was finished, but finally he continued, "I never realized how much her light…how much _she_ meant to me…until now, until after she was killed.

"My father...no, _Akunadin_," he corrected himself, "killed her so that I may have a power that rivals that of the Egyptian Gods. He wanted me to become King of the Shadows.

"But she…she saved me, she saved my _soul_. She told me to look towards the light, to live in it."

Now he looked at her, and said, almost imploringly, "What am I supposed to do now, Isis? How can I look towards the light when the only light in my life has been extinguished forever?"

Isis turned away from his pleading eyes, and instead looked down at her lap. She could still feel his eyes, searching her face for some glimmer of hope, some solace—some way for her to return.

But there was…

She swallowed and absently brushed her fingers against the Eye of her Tauk.

"The only thing you can do is live your life the way that she wanted you to. You haven't lost her forever. She's still watching over you, protecting you. The least you can do for her is live and rule with compassion and justice."

Isis met his intent gaze. "You still have her light. It's there, within your heart. Your memories of her keep her alive within you."

She took her hand and gently placed it on his cold, pale one.

"If you feel that you have no one to live for, then live for _her_."

His azure eyes flashed with comprehension.

"Isis, I…"

Shaking her head, Isis squeezed his hand reassuringly. "There is nothing that you need to say. Only understand that, should you need me, I am always here."

Isis stood and quietly began walking back to the palace. She had taken no more than a couple of steps when a hand gently caught her fingers and whirled her back around. When she had caught her balance, she looked up. In an attempt to conceal her astonishment, Isis averted her gaze to the ground.

His lips touched her forehead.

"My…my lord…"

"_Seth_," he corrected gently, before stepping past her and walking away, replacing the headdress as he did so.

Isis felt herself smile as she watched him walk away. She took a moment to send off a prayer for the well-being of her new King and the soul of his protector before following him back inside.

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_They did it not only for themselves, but also for each other...because for them, amidst the turmoil and uncertainty plaguing their lives, there was only room for joint commiseration...sometimes unspoken...but always understood. _


End file.
